A 27 year old's (mis)adventures in and out of Manila — from sights, sounds, and scenes — to living as a millennial in this crazy/beautiful city.

The Japan Diaries: A Day in Kyoto

It’s such a shame that I have only written five blog posts this year. FIVE. What a waste it is for a blog with my own domain. 😦

I know I’ve said many times before that I’ll make an effort to write more, but alas, here I am, about to promise the same thing, in the hopes that I will actually get to fulfill it. Nothing particularly interesting has happened in my life as of late, so perhaps I’ll pick up from where I left off in my series of photo posts — Day 3 of our Japan company trip LAST YEAR.

Pathetic, I know.

Well, sad as this blog is for the lack of posts, I bet the succeeding photos taken in Kyoto will more than make up for it. We visited both Osaka and Kyoto last year, and Kyoto is my surefire favorite from that trip.

I remember sitting inside the bus and looking at the marvelous city composed of clean, tree-lined streets. This is urban planning at its BEST. Kyoto may be a modern city but at its core is Japanese culture and tradition that everyone is proud of. Houses keep their historic facade and buildings are kept at a certain height to preserve the old world feel of the city. No spectacular skyscrapers here, and yet the city feels majestic.

I’m so thankful to have visited Japan during the fall season, because autumn’s colors just made everything even more beautiful. The Kyoto leg of our trip was filled with temple visits and I was especially giddy to see the Fushimi Inari Shrine, an iconic spot that was featured in one of my favorite movies of all time, Memoirs of a Geisha.

We also had a hearty kaiseki-style meal in one of Kyoto’s restaurants. Everything served to us was heavenly. One takeaway from this trip is that Japanese food is indeed, food for the gods. Just utterly perfect.

I also had the joy of experiencing great customer service in this Hello Kitty Store in Kyoto. The shop was manned by an elderly couple, and while I only purchased a few items that are not even expensive, they treated me with utmost respect and expressed gratitude like I bought everything in their store.

To top it all off, the weather in Kyoto that day had just the right amount of chill and I even found myself removing my coat a couple of times. People close to me know how I am with cold weather, and the moderate cold added to the delight of the experience.